Of Wolves and Men
by samsjazz
Summary: Jacob Black imprints on Renesmee, the daughter of the love of his life and best friend.  Through the shock and horror of her birth he fights the bond his ancestors assigned him and faces the future of his choosing. All JPOV. O/S


This is my submission for Easy As Breathing's "Breaking the Imprint" O/S Contest. The prompt was that Jacob had to imprint on Renesmee like in the book and then at some point in the future, either immediate or further down the road, he has to break it and have a J/B ending

Author: Samsjazz

Words: 20,550

Rating: M

Of Wolves and Men

I pushed a large lungful of air into the pale fragile body below me, begging her to keep fighting, to keep living. I ignored the vile taste of acid and coagulated blood that was ever present on her lips and now mine. At the sound of her uneven racing heartbeats, I began to pump her heart into a more constant rhythm. I was frantic to save the life before me as was my wolf.

I knew I had promised moments ago to allow the change she wanted. To make sure that this wouldn't cause a war between the wolves and the Cullens. That insured that I wouldn't have to kill my best friend, but now that I was here, in this room, forcing life into her moments at a time, I could no longer stand by those words. I didn't want her to die, but I didn't want her to change either. This was one fight I wasn't going to lose, no matter how much she wanted me to.

I yelled through my thoughts, knowing he'd hear me loud and clear. 'I, as Ephraim's heir, withdraw my permission to violate the treaty. I deny you the right to change her. If you go against me, I will bring both packs down on you and make the hounds of Hell look tame.'

The sound I heard next, one that would haunt me for years to come, shook my bones and caused my actions to falter for a moment. The sound of shredding steel, the sound of vampires being torn apart, echoed in the room and in my head. I glanced over to see Edward chewing his way into the bulge, which was Bella's child.

It was the most revolting sight of my life. I fought back against the bile that wanted to make its way out of my throat. I turned back to her and blew another strong breath into her ravaged body.

She coughed but her eyes remained closed and unmoving. Only her cough gave me hope.

As I continued to pump life through the heart I ached to possess, I felt the beginnings of the loss I was soon to face and the hope I had just received was quickly forgotten. With every compression of her chest, I could hear as her heart became weaker and slowed. I was losing the only thing I really thought was worth living for. She was falling away even as I fought my hardest to keep her here. I could feel myself following her, losing piece by piece, being torn apart, as she moved closer and closer to the final beat of her fragile heart.

She had told me months ago that her heart beats had been numbered. I had hated those words and their meaning. I hated the fact she was prematurely ending her life for _him. _For an existence that was only an echo of living. Never had this event entered my thoughts as a possibility for her to leave this earth. But here she was, slipping away, each heart beat getting closer and closer to zero.

I tried to ignore the grotesque horror of the scene before me, but her very life essence stained my lips and I tasted the rust with every ragged breath I breathed.

"Goddammit, Bells, fight! Fight!" I yelled, my voice cracking under the weight of reality. "You promised me, you fucking promised me you'd fight. Stay with me!"

A sudden screech sounded throughout the room. The wail of a small child cut through my ragged breaths and her shallow ones, but I didn't turn my gaze from Bella. I was too afraid that if I looked away for even a tiny fraction of a second that it'd be the moment she slipped away.

"It's a girl," I heard Edward breathe from next to me. Bella had been wrong-wrong on so many levels. It sickened me to hear such adoration given to the thing that had sucked the life out of the one thing I loved.

"Edward, help me save her, please!" I screamed, hoping to break the thrall that…whatever the fuck it was, had on him to save Bella.

"I can't just put her on the ground!" He yelled back, not moving.

"Throw her out of the fucking window for all I care, just help me save Bella!"

A quiet, demure even, voice came from the doorway, "I'll take her," The blonde bitch said. Both Edward and I growled at her entry into the room but I really didn't care where that thing went.

As soon as the spawn and the ice queen were gone, Edward returned to Bella's side. "Move your hands, Jacob," he ordered. He had a large syringe with an even bigger needle in his hand and he was moving it over her heart. I could see a semi-opaque silver fluid within the syringe. At first I wondered what it was but as he moved it over her chest-where my hands had been seconds before- I knew what it was.

If he did what he was thinking of doing…and before I could even think, I shot my hand out and batted it from his hand. It flew into the wall and cracked, spilling its contents to the floor.

He growled the harshest sound I had ever heard come from him. It would have been menacing had I cared what he thought at the moment or if I wasn't terrified of losing Bella.

"You heard my thoughts. You are not fucking changing her on my watch, leech. You are going to help me save her, or so help me God you will be the last to feel the vengeance I lay down on your soulless family." My alpha timbre reverberated around the rooms as I yelled at him.

"I have to save her you imbecilic cur, if I don't do this she will die. I do not care if you give your permission to change her or not. It makes no difference to me, we are leaving soon anyways. Now move or I'll push you out of the way." He snarled and moved towards Bella, his teeth were glistening with venom and his eyes had lost all of their golden color. He looked like a hunter getting ready to attack his prey.

I moved quickly and without much thought and sent him flying in the direction of the syringe and he crashed into the wall. I saw the wall give beneath him but paid it no mind as my thoughts returned to my broken love.

"You are not changing her, now help me to save her-help me keep her alive or we will both lose her." I yelled back; malevolence and disgust thick in my voice and moved back towards her.

I resumed breathing breaths into her broken body, keeping her alive, so that she could continue to fight. I noticed the presence of two more bloodsuckers as I pushed two more lungfuls of air into her.

I stood working on her relentlessly and saw the doctor working quickly down by Bella's open abdomen. I didn't know quite what he was doing. The other one-Esme, I think-was hooking up an IV to her other hand along with a large bag of blood. Edward had taken over my job of pumping her heart.

"Edward, why aren't you changing her?" The doc asked, never faltering on his task.

"We weren't given permission to change her; Jacob only wants us to keep her alive." Edward responded with a glare to me.

"Jacob, give her air," the doc ordered mechanically, and I complied. The mama leech left not long after she had hooked Bella up so the three of us remained in the room pumping life into the broken doll on the table.

We all did our jobs in frantic silence but as we worked, I felt the pull to save her lessen. My wolf had already given up, but I couldn't yet; giving up on her meant giving up on me.

Her skin had taken on a sickly grey pallor that turned my gut; the fluorescent of the room only intensifying the deathly color. Her heart beat, kept strong only by Edward's strong pumps, would stutter an odd staccato in between. It cut my soul. Her breaths seemed shallow and empty, like I was no longer forcing life into her; it shredded my heart.

The inexplicable pull I had felt toward her, with her, since the moment she came to me to fix her, was gone; I didn't even feel an echo of it as I stared at her bleeding, broken and forced to remain alive body. While her heart pumped and her lungs held air, it was the artificial workings of Edward and me. Bella was no longer in there; I had lost her. I had lost the fight for my soul. Because that was where we had bonded-at soul level.

The doc pushed me away as he tilted her head back and stuck something down her throat. I saw as he pushed the tube down her throat and then connected a bag to the tube. Edward then began pumping her chest and squeezing the bag. The doc walked around the room at vamp speed, pulling out drugs in little vials and filling syringes. He then rushed to Bella and injected the unknown substances in the IV bag.

I watched the two for a moment, working over the girl I loved, listening to the forced breaths and heartbeats, and I cracked. All I saw before me was a corpse. She was gone, whether her heart was beating now or not didn't matter because it wasn't beating on its own. Her body had given up the fight to bring her child into the world. I lost the fight I had worked so hard to continue.

Her last moments had been filled with terror and pain. I would never see her beautiful chocolate eyes shine with joy as I told her a stupid joke. Or glow in excitement as we took the bikes out for an afternoon ride. I would never see her cheeks bloom red in embarrassment. I would never get in a pointless argument with her again.

The soul shredding agony I was in as I stumbled out of the claustrophobic room was strangling. Every breath I took in cut and burned. My feet felt like lead. Every step was heavy and I fought to move. I felt a pull in my chest, pulling me down the stairs.

My wolf was struggling to get down those stairs-probably for the forest-and move away from the love of my life. I allowed him to guide me because my compass was gone. I decided as I moved closer to freedom from this hell, that I was going to give into my wolf and run. I would run as far and as fast as I could away from this place and forever remain in his skin because the pain I was in now was too much and I never wanted to feel even a sliver of it.

The memories, the images that were on repeat in my brain, I wanted them gone. No one should have to remember their best friend, the person they love, the way I was going to remember her. It was wrong.

I reached the bottom of the steps as the pull became stronger, but it wasn't from the direction I was expecting. The pull, which felt like a hook in my rib cage, was moving me towards the living room. The room where everything had gone so horribly wrong-seconds, minutes, hours, or days before-I didn't know. I could still smell the blood permeating the air and it burned me worse than the seven combined scents of the vampires.

Those stupid bloodsuckers had taken her from me; if they had just stayed the fuck away, then she wouldn't be dead right now. I would have taken the time to fix her without that leech ever coming back and ruining her. We would be happy and living our life together. But no, they came back and now she was dead and torn open like she was made of paper mache. The spawn that had torn her open was here, in the very room I had begged its mother to fight.

A fury that I had never felt before rolled through me. Even at my most angry before, it only seemed like an echo of what I was experiencing now. I was so angry I knew I wouldn't phase, I was beyond that. This was coming from the man in me, not the wolf. This was coming from a place where a man who has lost everything has to fight, because he has nothing left to fight for.

As my eyes locked on Blondie, I focused that intense rage burning inside of me on her and the tiny thing in her arms. The tiny little thing, that was sucking greedily on a bottle, a bottle that only added to the scent of blood in the room, had taken everything from me; taken the life I held above all others. I decided then that I was going to take its life. I focused so that I could effortlessly complete my task. I knew that they would kill me for this but I didn't care because I would join Bella afterwards and that was worth any amount of pain I'd feel at their hands.

That soulless abomination lying gently in the blonde vampire's arms should have been destroyed; I should have helped Edward force her to get rid of it. I shouldn't have let her get her way. She had gotten that too often, and it cost her, and me, her life.

The bitch shifted the child in her arms, resting its small head on her shoulder. It was so tiny and yet my anger didn't abate at this fact. It turned its head and looked up at me. The moment its eyes met mine- warm melted chocolate eyes like Bella's had been…

…And all movement stopped. I was frozen in my steps and I felt absolutely nothing.

The pain I had felt a moment ago, gone, and warmth I had never felt, strong and- glowing like the sun- it flooded me and all my senses. Everything in me came undone as I stared into the warm brown eyes of the little girl in front of me. All that had made up my world, all the ties that held me to it, were snipped away and reformed in a single unbreakable bond around this singular, beautiful, ethereal entity. Her beautiful chocolate eyes- _her_ eyes- pooled with warmth and love and my heart lightened and was drawn in. My feet moved without a thought as the pull I had felt before was doubled and tripled to bring me to this tiny beautiful creature. She had a beautiful head of coppery locks with just the faintest hint of curl. Her nose and eyes were what sucked me in though; they were all Bella's. This tiny thing in the blonde vampire's arms held me securely to the earth.

She was Bella's daughter and I…im...

Wait. Fuck.

_No, no, no,_ my mind screamed as my wolf became overjoyed. This could not be happening, not now, not ever. Bella was the one for me. I had known it instinctively since the moment she came to me, broken and alone, that day with the bikes. I had felt a pull to her, our friendship that could never be explained. This couldn't be the reason. It was wrong, an abomination. She shouldn't exist and this bond- this imp…- shouldn't either.

Even as I thought this, my wolf rebelled within me. He had chosen his mate, his other half, and I thought he was absolutely off his rocker. There was no way that the half-spawn child of the love of my life, Isabella Swan, was my soul mate.

No. Never.

But the draw he felt towards her was indescribable. The others didn't even do this feeling justice when describing their imp-…bonds. He wanted to hold and comfort her, love and protect her. He wanted to be her everything for always. Every one of his thoughts sickened me.

All of this had taken seconds and as the ice queen registered my presence, she whipped up and around and backed away with a sharp hiss. My wolf growled at her for taking its mate away and it fought to move closer. I fought my wolf and remained frozen where I stood. I didn't and wouldn't give in to this. I wouldn't give in to this.

A heavy silence fell over the bright room as the two of us appeared to stand off but my ears caught a sound my heart had given up hope of hearing, a strong beating heart. A heart that was beating on its own and no longer powered by outside forces.

I felt a distinct shift within myself. I had been one entity with two separate physical forms that could smoothly transition from one to the other; now I was two separate entities contained in one body, whether that be the body of a man or of a wolf, we were no longer united.

His choice had forever cleaved us in two.

With one last glance at the little girl in Blondie's arms, I turned and ran back up the stairs. I didn't like this feeling that was tearing me apart. As much as the child had become my world, her mother still meant so much to me. The baby was the whole world to my wolf, not me. I was being pulled by my wolf down the stairs and I was pulling myself to the side of the woman I knew I still belonged with. I wouldn't let her lose importance in my life just because this was forced upon me. I still had a choice and I knew it.

I entered the room to see Bella still laid out on the table but now she was modestly covered with a bright white sheet. But that wasn't what got my attention. What pulled my eyes and stung my heart was that now, Bella was on a ventilator.

The machine was breathing for her. I could see the rhythmic and steady pumping of it above her head. My ears were assaulted by the steady beep, beep, beep. I was astonished. Where had Doc Fang gotten all of these machines?

The scene before me cut deep and drew out memories I tried so hard to get rid of, memories of a darker haired, darker skinned and much older woman hooked up to the same machines. She was my world then; just as the woman before me was mine now. I drew my eyes around the room and saw the doc writing things down and I saw Edward sitting in a chair, head in his hands as he absentmindedly ran his fingers through his hair. His shoulders were slumped and his elbows were rested on his knees. He looked everything like the man I had seen days before, burning from the inside out.

I wondered how bad she was because I couldn't get past the joy of her being alive.

"Did what I think happen, really just happen down there, Jacob?" Edward asked, his voice was gruff but lacked much emotion.

"I don't want to talk about that. I want to know how she is," I deflected. I wasn't ready to deal with what had happened downstairs even though my wolf was rebelling within me to get down there.

"We're going to have to talk about this at some point. She is my daughter."

"You don't think I don't know that. You can hear my thoughts, you know it isn't anything like the others. You know I still love Bella the same; that's Bella's daughter for Christ's sake. I'm not going to talk about this anymore, just tell me how she is."

"She's in a coma," was all he said. Fine, if he wasn't going to tell me, I was going to ask someone else.

"Hey, Doc, how is she?" I asked, turning towards the doc sitting at his desk. I knew he had heard everything said between Edward and I, but I was doing my best to completely ignore the situation even though my wolf was freaking out. The only thing that mattered right now was Bella.

"Like Edward said, she's in a coma. When you had left the room, she was already clinically dead but we got her back. Her body has gone through quite a bit of trauma and this is its way to help her focus on healing. Even if she hadn't fallen into a coma, I would have put her in one. Along with her cesarean incision, she has a broken spine that will require surgery and she has lost quite a large amount of blood and is receiving a transfusion at the moment. With the spinal injury, she will take quite some time to recover. My guess at the moment is close to a year," Carlisle informed me solemnly.

"When will she wake up?" My joy of her being alive was quickly succumbing under the disparity of her current situation.

"Now that, I'm not entirely sure about. Right now, it's all up to her but when I go and work on her spine, I am going to make sure she stays in a medical induced coma for some time afterwards."

"When…when will she…will you perform the surgery?"

"Right now there is too much swelling, but I think it will happen within the week."

"You should have just changed her, like she wanted." I heard the syrupy sweet tinkling coming from Blondie. I should have known she was coming closer as my wolf had been settling down within me. I stiffened in response to the baby coming near me. I didn't like the feelings and instincts running through me, from the wolf, when she was near-hell, I still didn't even know her name.

"Renesmee."

"What?"

"Her name, it's Renesmee." So, they really were going with the wacky name Bells picked out-poor kid. I dutifully ignored the happy dance my wolf gave at her name and the subsequent replaying of it until it was a humming in the back of my mind.

I was not going to fall to this fate. I was going to make my own decisions on who I chose to love.

"You do remember that she's married and she made her choice already, right?" Edward spat.

Ass.

"I don't need to be reminded of that fact. I know, okay? But she is my best friend, and even you can't take that from me."

"Rosalie, Edward, had you attempted to change her when you did, it would have killed her; Jacob was right by forcing us to save her. She's too weak to change; her heart isn't strong enough at the moment. So, we will wait until she is, to make the decision of when or if she still wants to be changed." The doc said, looking at his adopted daughter.

"He's right. Had they attempted, she would have died." The little pixie spoke up from behind the blonde.

"Now, let's check out little Renesmee." He stood and walked around his desk and headed to the baby.

I decided to leave the room. I didn't want to be near her at the moment, not when I was trying to fight with my wolf. I was worried that if I stayed close to her, if I were to touch and hold her, than I would give into this wolf joo-joo, and that was not going to happen.

I walked up to the fragile looking girl under the sheet. I kissed her forehead. "Bella, I have some things I have to deal with, but I will be back soon. You hang in there and keep fighting." With that, I left the vamp house and headed out into the woods surrounding their house.

I didn't phase, I wasn't going to give into the wolf anymore, not unless it was absolutely necessary. He had made a moronic decision earlier today and I wasn't going to let him be in control of anything anymore.

I walked back to La Push, thinking about everything I was going to have to deal with. Things I was going to have to admit. I didn't want to face Sam and the others but I didn't have the choice.

* * *

><p>The constant and deafening beeps of the heart monitor on the other side of the bed and the whooshing of the ventilator became white noise as I struggled to stay awake. It was also an ever constant reminder of the current condition. My head, resting on my clenched palm, kept drooping under the weight of my exhaustion. I was so tired-a soul deep, bone tired-only in this room, near her, could I ever get close enough to fall into the peaceful oblivion that was sleep.<p>

But I wouldn't succumb. I sat upright and pushed my feet further out in front of me, settled uncomfortably in the too small chair and locked my eyes on the frail, pale and too tiny body in front of me.

It's been over three weeks since the horrible day she fell into the god forsaken coma and I entered a new level of hell, which is saying a lot for me.

Seeing her lying in the bed, never moving, never talking or mumbling to give me the illusion that she was just sleeping tore at me like nothing ever had. The doc had moved her to the hospital two weeks ago to perform the surgery needed to repair her spine and the damage done to her abdomen but she has yet to wake up.

The agony of waiting and watching for her to wake up and having all those days go by was slowly killing the hope everyone had of her ever waking up. Because of this, I was filled with so much guilt and self-hatred that I hadn't been able to get more than two or three hours of consecutive sleep.

When I was in that room with Edward, ordering him to keep her alive and refusing to change her, I had been selfish. I couldn't let her die and I believed that becoming one of those things was death. But now, three weeks later, looking at her, knowing she might never wake up, I had moments of doubt where I wished I had allowed Edward to change her. To let her be what she had wanted to become. Because if I had, then right now she would be moving, awake and she would actually be around for her daughter.

Now she had an endless line of visitors but she didn't know any of them were actually there. Her daughter, who was aging scarily fast, looking like a toddler instead of the infant she was supposed to be asked about her mother constantly. As much as I didn't want the bond between her and my wolf, I didn't like that Bella was missing out on her daughter's incredibly short childhood.

The words that Dr. Fang had told me earlier were reverberating around my head, the sense of dread continuing to eat at my gut. He warned me and Charlie (who spent almost as much time at the hospital as me and Cullen) that the longer she remained in the state she was in, the less likely she'd ever wake up. I could tell that as time went on only Charlie and I were the ones that still had hope she'd ever wake up.

The majority of the Cullens had lost that hope a long time ago-I could see it in their eyes-when the pixie had learned she couldn't _see_ Bella wake up, ever. I didn't care that they had hope or not, I just wanted people behind Bella, supporting her. It wouldn't help her if we all gave up on her. From what I learned about the tiny sprite's visions, I figured it had to do with the fact that Bella wasn't able to make the decision to wake up. I also knew that she couldn't see me and the baby was incredibly fuzzy for her. Combine all that and you get her gummed up visions. But all in all, I really didn't care that the pixie couldn't see her.

Only Charlie's constant presence by his daughters side made the regret of not letting her be changed go away. Seeing his love and worry for her bleed out of his pores and shine out of his eyes made the fight for her life worth it. I could tell, seeing him like this, that he wouldn't have survived either her death or what he'd of thought was her death when she was turned.

I just wished she would wake up.

I missed seeing her bright chocolate orbs that would shine whenever we joked around. I missed seeing everything she was hiding from me flash through her eyes as she stomped her foot in defiance to something I said. I missed her peals of laughter at watching the antics of the pack.

I just missed my best friend and I would give anything if she would just open her beautiful warm brown eyes.

Sadly, Bella's health or lack thereof wasn't the only reason my life had taken the road to bedlam. My wolf's choice of mate, of the titanium strong bond now connecting my body to the young half-ling, the one that cleaved us apart, was slowly and torturously tearing me apart day by day.

I hadn't phased since the day I had run to the city to foolishly look for my imprint. I refused to; giving in and phasing, giving control to the wolf wasn't going to happen. His last moment of control was to try to take my choice away from me, to force a mate on me that I found morally reprehensible, disgusting and just plain wrong. I was and will always be in love with Bella Swan (*cough* gag* Cullen) and the wolf binding himself to her daughter disgusted me and made my skin crawl. He'd never be in control again.

The only problem is that I had never gone this long without phasing before. Add in the fact that I-not that long ago-spent close to two solid months as a wolf, surviving with his basic instincts. For me, he was already very close to the surface. On a normal day, I had to fight very hard to keep him buried. Now, with him trying to itch and claw his way out, it made it that much more difficult.

I was an irritable, short-fused mess, but I never gave in and phased; much to the confusion and anger of Seth and Leah respectively. They both visited me at my house while I was working on cars when I couldn't visit Bella. They just didn't understand how I had fought so hard to separate myself from Sam's pack only to stop and not fight. It didn't help that I refused to tell anyone other than Sam and my father about the bond now shared between my wolf and Mae, Bella's daughter. Without me to tell them what to do, the Clearwaters just ended up running around the woods whenever they felt like it; I couldn't care less.

When I told Sam and my dad everything, the day it all happened, to say they were shocked would be an understatement. They had no explanation for why it had happened as it went against everything they believed about it. Nor could they explain that while my wolf felt completely different, I as a man did not. Bella had not lost an ounce of importance to me. I loved her just the same as I did before the baby was born.

While they supported me on anything I chose to do on that front, that was as far as their support ran. Because there was no way either of them would ever push me to be with a half-leech. Dad and I butted heads about my actions in regards to me taking my rightful place in the pack only to go rouge to protect leeches. Sam and I had the problem of being two Alphas in a confined area; neither of our wolves liked being in close proximity to the other which made my wolf fight that much harder to get out. To avoid them pushing me to phase, I tended to stay out of La Push. Thankfully, Charlie took me in and let me stay in Bells' room.

Just trying to sleep every night surrounded by her scent would calm me enough so that my muscles would loosen and I could rest, but then the faint scent of the leech I detested most would travel up from her bed and sleep would again evade me. But I didn't leave-couldn't leave-where her scent could fill my waking dreams.

While close proximity to Sam and the Cullens pushed my wolf closer to the surface, it was the presence of the littlest Cullen that made my choice to not phase, and keep the wolf in check, all the harder. As I spent every day by Bella's side, Cullen did as well, often times bringing little Mae (the nickname the ice bitch and the big one so lovingly bestowed on her, *gag*) with him.

Being within fifty feet of her brought the wolf roaring to the surface, his need to protect and love her nearly uncontrollable, which would cause me to twitch and tremor the entire time she remained close. I looked like a meth addict in need of my next hit.

Usually when he brought her, I would get up and leave, not able to take more than ten minutes in the room with her. The wolf inside would become rabid and fight to the point where if I didn't leave the room, I'd phase. Not that it bothered either of us. He hated me as much as I hated him; we just had an understanding that our battle waited until after Bells woke up.

Cullen usually brought Mae when he knew Charlie wouldn't be there. He hadn't even been told of his grandchild yet, and likely never would be. Everything was just too hard to explain to a man not of this world. I enjoyed spending time in Bella's room with Charlie.

So with Cullen juggling seeing Bella with keeping Charlie away from Mae there were moments like the one I was in now where I got to be completely alone with Bella, just watching her every blink and twitch, hoping for a miracle. It was times like these that I imagined it was I who was in the room with her when she woke up.

The peace I was experiencing with my best friend was interrupted by Cullen himself with Mae perched on his hip and head resting on his shoulder, staring intently at me, studying me. The agonizing look in Cullen's eyes (the one that hasn't left since he asked me to do the impossible) has lost some of its pain but only because he has his daughter to look after. But I couldn't give a shit about him; it was his damn fault we were all here anyway.

"Hello, Jacob, "she said in her perfect angelic voice. I fought to ignore the pleasure that shot through me at hearing her say my name. I could feel the pull thrum through my veins trying to get me to move to her, to take her in my arms and never let go. I fought it and I could feel the twitching coming on.

I felt so completely torn whenever she was in the room. Half of me-my wolf- wanted me to give in and accept this thing between Mae and me, to just stop fighting my instincts, and just live in the pleasure of the bond. The other part, the stronger part, fought every second she was within proximity of me to keep control and never give in. At the moment, the bond hadn't progressed or strengthened from that first initial moment. It was easier to fight that way because she wasn't bonded to me like I was her.

The half that was fighting the bond also looked to the beautiful comatose Bella. The human side of me also felt a bond with her, almost the same soul deep connection that the wolf had with Mae, but I didn't fight that, I never had. I felt that with her from the moment we reacquainted over a year ago on First Beach.

The two bonds warred within me and against me. I hated it and I knew that I wanted my choice back. I knew there was only one option for me. Before I could get further lost in the thoughts the mind fuck was pulling from me, I replied back to Bella's daughter.

"Hello, Mae, Cullen," I shot back, my voice sounding more gentle than I intended. "Well, I gotta book it, check ya later." I stood and quickly moved to the door. I needed to get out of the room.

Before I made it to the door, a voice called to me. "Jacob, Bella is being moved back home tomorrow afternoon where Carlisle can give her round the clock care." With a nod that I heard what he said, I walked out of the room pissed.

Just great, just fucking great. Now I'd have to go to stank central to see her and I knew that it'd be that much harder to fight this wolf crap where I'd be surrounded by her scent and the combined scent of the seven parasites. If only Bella would just wake up. I could tell her everything I wanted to say and then… I hadn't figured that part out yet.

I needed to think, so instead of heading to Charlie's like I would usually do, I headed to La Push-more specifically, the beach. I trekked slowly to the one place on the entirety of First Beach that made my heart ache with longing. My mind was brought back to that day over a year and half ago where my love for a brown eyed brunette grew to a proportion I'd never thought possible, had begun. I stared at that lone, bleached out, old driftwood log and wished for those simple days back.

I sat heavily on the log and just hung my head, taking in everything that was weighing on my shoulders. I tried to figure out some semblance of order in all the mess.

I knew I couldn't go much longer like this. With every exposure I had to Mae, my wolf fought harder to get to her and grew stronger, to perform the duties he was created for. With everything I had been dealing with, I was reaching the limits of my exhaustion and strength. If I gave in, I knew I'd lose.

I knew I was going to have to leave again. I needed to get out of here and far away from Mae. I'd be easier to fight my wolf, to get rid of him, if I wasn't around her daily. I had slowly been coming up with enough money from working on cars in my spare time, that when I left I'd be able to survive until I found a job when I got to wherever I was going.

I couldn't do what I had done the last time I left. There would be no living in the woods surviving on nature this time. I was going to do this and on my own, it was my choice. Even if Bella sent me away in the end and chose to become a leech, I was doing this so that I could have a choice. The choice that had been taken from me since the moment those godforsaken parasites moved into town.

I was so consumed in my thoughts, I didn't hear the approach of someone walking on a mission. But I did feel the overly strong slap of a very pissed off she-wolf that sent me to the beach in an undignified flop.

"What in God's fuck is the reason you break off from the pack, patrol until you're dead on your feet and then the moment the devil's spawn is born you quit? Why the hell did you just leave us like that?" Like I said, she was pissed at me. I fought like hell to keep the growl in that rose up in my chest when she called Mae the devil's spawn.

"I don't have to explain this to you. I'm just not phasing anymore." I didn't want to explain to her about the imp…bond crap. I hated thinking about it and after telling Sam and Dad, I never talked about it.

"You damn well better explain it to me and why the fuck aren't you phasing anymore?"

"I'm giving my wolf up, for good…"

She interrupted, "Jake, what's going on? Before this, you were planning on running away once she was dead, as a wolf. And now you're giving up the wolf?" Her brows were furrowed and she had lost most of the bitterness in her voice. She looked very un-Leah like.

"Nothing's going on other than the fact that Bella hasn't woken up yet. I just don't want to be this anymore. I don't want my choices taken from me anymore; I want to be in control. So, I'm taking control and giving up the wolf. He won't dictate my life to me any longer."

"You know, just because she's still human doesn't mean she'll chose you. She's married, Jake; she has a child with him–as sick as that is. She's made it obvious she doesn't want you."

"This has nothing to do with Bella. I'm doing this for me," I snapped back at her.

"It doesn't? So you're not giving up the wolf to show her the great human life you could give her? Even if she chose you, what will you do when you imprint and leave her?" I stiffened and her eyes narrowed further.

"No, and an imp…it's just not an issue."

"Oh really, is the great Jacob Black too good to imprint?" She scoffed.

"Leah, I've got to go check up on Bella. I'll see you later." I stood and began to walk.

"You know, she's going to hate you for stopping her from becoming one of them. Why'd you do it anyway?" She yelled from behind me.

"Because I couldn't-I can't live in a world where she is dead. All I've ever wanted for her is to live. If she lives with the leech, so be it; as long as she's alive. There was no way I was going to go to war with the Cullens and have to watch her die through the eyes of my pack mates or be the one to kill her. And you may think that I'm giving my wolf up for her but I'm not.

"All of us becoming wolves took our choices away from us. I refuse to have any more taken from me. If she chooses to become one of those things, I won't be a wolf so I won't have to see it or participate in it. I want to choose who I love, even if she never loves me back the same way. I will have no more choices taken from me. Now, I'm going to go back to Forks. I'll see you around."

"Why go back to her when baby leech will just drain her dry anyways?" She snaps back.

I turned to her, trembling, "Stop, just stop being a heinous bitch. Stop taking your pain out on everyone else. Don't you get it? The woman I love almost died after I watched her be cut open and chewed on like some goddamn dog toy. I was literally keeping her alive with every breath I pushed into her lungs. I had the blood she spewed up staining my lips. And to top it all off, the goddamn spirits that cursed us all with wolves thought it cosmically funny to have me imprint on the love of my life's daughter. Every choice I had has been taken from me. Not this. I won't let this choice be made for me. I will not be with Bella's daughter. The wolf won't win. I'm sick of this crazy fucking world I was thrown into. All I want is normal again. All I want is to worry about paying the bills, finishing school, getting a good job and just living my life without all this goddamn supernatural bullshit screwing everything else up," I swore and turned to leave.

"You what?" She shrieked.

"You heard me," I bit out.

"You…y-y-you imprinted and you're…you're not bowing at the little demon's feet? What…How? I don't understand?" I turned back to her and her eyes were wide and wild. I knew how this subject affected her so I ignored her demon remark but I couldn't stop the wolf's rumbled growl in my chest.

"I did but I don't feel different. My wolf does, but I don't. I don't know how to explain it to you but it's different than the others. I haven't changed but if I give in to the wolf, if I phase, then I will change and this last choice will be lost on me. So the wolf and I are going our separate ways. I'm giving him up." With that I left her on the beach and went back to the hospital 'cause I knew Charlie was off work now and was at the hospital until visitor hours' end.

I know I'm going to leave but I just don't know when. That all depended on when Bella woke or when I couldn't fight against the bond with Mae any longer.

When I got to Bella's hospital room, she was alone again. I moved the chair close to the side of her bed and took her tiny delicate hand in mine. I needed this. Actual physical contact with her, it calmed me down and focused me for my internal battle.

"Heya, Bella. I really need you to wake up, 'cause I wanna be here when you do. There is so much I want to tell you, to talk to you about, and I can't do that unless you wake up and if you don't wake up soon, I'm gonna have to leave and I won't be back for a while."

I let my words float in the air knowing no one heard them and I just laid my head on the bed next to her hip listening to the rhythmic breathing from her ventilator. I sat like that for-I don't know how long-wishing her to wake up, when I felt the fingers within my grasp twitch and move. My head shot up and met the chocolate orbs I'd been aching to see. She stared at me wide eyed in confusion and fear. She looked absolutely enchanting.

"Shh, it's okay, Bella. I'm going to go get a doctor. Don't worry, I'll explain everything when I get back." I stood up and rushed out of the room to the nurses' station as some of the weight of the last month slowly started falling away.

The next several hours rushed by in a whirlwind. I had been kept out of the room as the doctors and nurses worked on Bella and ran tests. Sadly, any explaining was prevented as Charlie and Cullen were called. I knew I wouldn't get to talk to her for some time but I still didn't want to leave. So I sat and waited.

When the doc finally left the room, he surprised me by saying Bella was asking for me. He warned me that speaking was painful for her and to make sure she didn't do much of it.

I slowly walked in the room nervous-more nervous than I've ever been-and took her in as I walked around the side of her bed. She was finally off that retched ventilator and her hair was splayed out around her shoulders. She wasn't looking up but absently playing with the little pills of lint on her blanket with one hand and drawing aimlessly with the fingers of the other. She looked so beautiful to me. She gave me a small wave and an even smaller smile when she finally acknowledged my presence in the room.

I finally just took a moment to stare at her. Our eyes locked and I knew I was right. The bond we shared-the one that had formed those quiet days in my garage- hadn't lessened by the unforeseen actions of my wolf. I didn't love her any less than before all this happened. In fact, seeing her in this bed, fragile, pale but with a faint blush staining her cheeks, and so amazingly and beautifully human made me love her a little more.

"Hey, Bella, I've missed you so much," I said, my voice thick with emotion.

"Jake, "she croaked out, her voice hollow from disuse and the pulling of the ventilator tube.

"I am so happy you're awake, I've missed you so much," I said again-I felt it couldn't be said enough-and moved the chair back next to her bed and pulled her hand into mine. It was then that I noticed the small white board in her lap.

I noticed she had already written 'What happened?'

"Did the doc tell you anything?" I asked, worried how she'd take everything I did. I knew this talk was going to get heavy and I feared this would be the last time I ever saw her. I tried to force the lump that was now firmly lodged in my throat down when she shook her head no.

"When the…why'd you want to see me first, Bella, why not the-…Edward?" I asked nervously.

She looked at me for a long moment and then wiped what she had written before off the board and then wrote, "You told me you'd explain and you were the last face I saw and the first one I woke to." After she wrote, she looked up at me with her wide doe eyes imploring me to tell her and I knew why she asked for me. When it was serious like this, I had never kept anything from her.

"Okay, Bella, when everything happened, they brought you up to the study or whatever it was and then you passed out." I paused as the images I had fought for weeks to suppress came rushing back with full force.

I told her in detail what transpired after she lost consciousness. I told her of her broken spine and the loss of blood, my struggles to keep her breathing and her heart pumping.

"Bella, I know you were planning on being changed when the baby was born, but in that room, working so hard to keep you alive, literally forcing your heart to pump…I couldn't do it. I know…it wasn't my choice, it was yours. But…I can't live in the world where you're dead and watching Edward raise that vial of venom over your heart, I knew that if he put that in you, you'd be dead. You can hate me all you like, but you can hate me with a beating heart.

"The doc came back while me and Cullen were working on you and he got you to live but I thought you were gone. I felt that you were gone so I left the room because it hurt to see you so broken.

"You went into a coma and have been in one for just over three weeks. They had to do surgery on your spine to repair the damage done to it and you've been in the hospital ever since." She stared at me, her eyes holding tears but none fell. I could see her piercing eyes taking in everything, trying to decipher every look that passed over my face; she always could read me as well as I her.

'How's my boy?', she wrote next quickly.

"You were wrong, Bella," Her brows furrowed in confusion. "You had a little girl, not a little boy and she's…good. Edward named her Renesmee like you wanted."

She gave a brilliant smile and her eyes shown in a way I never saw before. I knew I'd have to tell her the stuff that haunted me and about my leaving.

"Uh, Bella, there's some other stuff that I have to tell you, stuff you should only hear from me, stuff you may not like. Everything else either the doc or Cullen can tell you." I was shaking with what I was going to tell her, my palms were sweating copiously and her eyes widened as she took me in.

"You can tell me anything, Jake," she barely whispered, brokenly.

"You know I love you and am in love with you, I always will be; _nothing_ will change that." She opened her mouth to interrupt but I held up my hand. "I know you believed that my imprint was out there. That I was just waiting for her to come and then you'd mean less to me and then I'd move on from you. You were right and you were wrong." I ran my hands through my hair roughly pulling on the strands to fight back the nausea of the truth. It was one thing telling Sam and my dad and yelling it at Leah in anger. It was entirely another telling Bella that I had done it to her daughter.

"I love you the same today as I did the day in my room when you told me I wasn't enough. The only difference today is that my wolf no longer feels the same. Something happened after…" I took a deep shuddering breath. "…when I left you, after I thought you were dead…I was so lost that I didn't realize what I was feeling from my wolf. He was pulling me, moving me closer. I just…if I had known I would have just run out of there with my eyes closed. I never wanted this…" I threw my hands out angrily motioning at something she had no clue about and wasn't corporeal for me to actually strangle. Though had it been, I would have-a lot.

"Jake?" She asked, her brows furrowed in worry and she looked scared.

"Bella, I i-im-imprinted." Her breathing paused and her eyes grew impossibly wide. "But the thing is, Bella, I don't feel any less for you than I did before. I still love you, the imprint didn't take it away or write over it like it did for Sam; it's just that my wolf is fighting for the bond."

"Who?" She whispered.

"I imprinted on Renesmee. But I need you to know something. I'm not giving in to this. I'm rejecting it 'cause even if I didn't love you there is no way I'm ever going to let this supernatural crap choose my mate, my life partner, the woman I love. This is my choice and mine alone. So because of this, I'm giving up the wolf. I'm done with all of this crap. You will always be important to me, Bella, but I can't let any more of my life be taken from me; I can't be imprisoned like this anymore.

"I have always wanted for you to live, to stay human. I've fought so hard for you to stay this way but I can't fight any more as a wolf. I have to give him up or he will stake his claim on your daughter and that just makes me sick. I am going away for a while, to get away from Renesmee. I never wanted this life, it's taken' everything from me and I'm going to take it back. This shit took my choice away as much as hers and I won't let it do this to either of us. The closer I am to her, the harder it is to fight the imprint. So, I'm leaving La Push for a while. I don't know where I'm going but if you want, when I get there, I'll let you know where I am.

"I need you to know how badly I want to stay here. To be by your side and be your best friend, to help you through all this, 'cause I know it's going to be a lot to deal with. But I can't. I've already come to my limit with this thing-I don't have much more strength to fight this; if you hadn't woken up when you did, you would've woken up with me gone and I didn't want to do that." I took another shuddering breath, this was harder than I thought it'd be.

"You will always be my best friend, Bella, always. But if after all this, you choose to become one of them, I have to tell you I can't see you anymore because I'm afraid it'd bring the wolf back and I want him gone for good. I will love you, whatever you are-always-just know that, like I said on my bed. Even after your heart quits and your skin becomes stone, I will love you with all of me."

"You're leaving?" She wrote in giant letters across the board.

"Yeah, I'll probably leave tomorrow. I was just waiting for you to wake up so I could tell you all this myself. I'll head out now, let Charlie and your husband see ya." I stood and leaned over her, placed a kiss to her forehead and took in a lung full of her blissful scent, hoping it wouldn't be my last but fearing it would be.

"Goodbye, Bella." I pulled away from her and turned to leave the room.

"Jake," she whispered, barely audible. "Call me when you get there." I nodded my head and left the room. I noticed she hadn't said goodbye back.

I didn't look at either Charlie or Cullen as I left the room and headed back to Charlie's. I left a note on the table that I was heading back to La Push and that I'd see him the next day.

* * *

><p>The day after Bella woke up from her coma, I packed up and headed out of La Push for the second time that year. Only this time I didn't have the approval or support of my father and I didn't know when I'd be coming back. And though I thought I'd be truly alone for the first time in my life, much to my surprise as I hopped into my car to leave, a very determined looking Leah Clearwater was standing in front of my car with two duffel bags of clothes in her hands. I wanted to protest but couldn't find it in me so I allowed her to tag along.<p>

After telling Charlie that I was going away for a while to figure some things out, Leah and I headed out of town. We drove aimlessly. Heading in one direction and then finding a new road on a whim. Mostly, we drove south and east until we ended up in a little town in Colorado about a week into our drive. There were enough forests around to remind us somewhat of home but we were finally far enough away that I didn't feel that incessant pull from my wolf to return to La Push any longer.

For the first time in close to a year, I began living my life for no one but me. I got an apartment with Leah and we both got jobs-me a part time one so that I could get my general education degree.

I kept my promise to Bella and called her and told her where I was and what I was doing but that is all the contact I made. Everything after that was up to her, but she never called and I let it be but wished she'd contact me.

The first three months away were hell as the wolf fought harder and harder to get out. I took up running the vast bike paths and hiking trails of our new home to wear my body and wolf out so that I could sleep and function on a daily level and so even he didn't have the strength to fight me.

Not surprising was that Leah had also decided to give up her wolf. The life of the wolf had taken more from her than it had from me and she didn't want to imprint. She kept saying that if she ever loved again it was going to be on her terms and not her wolf's.

I worked hard to stay busy trying not to think about what was going on back in La Push and Forks. I missed everyone back there and worried unendingly about my dad and Bells. I kept trying not to think about what was happening with Bella. Problem was, she never really left my thoughts; she was always in the background. By month six, I finally felt like I had control of my wolf and he was finally slipping away from me. His fight was finally leaving him. I had never been happier to start feeling weaker.

With my GED in hand, I started taking some business and auto tech classes at the local Community College. It helped that I already had a job at a body shop. I was planning on opening my own place once I went back to La Push.

One thing I learned while living my life was to relax again. The moment I had become a wolf I was always so tightly wound, always ready to phase at a moment's notice. It felt amazing to breathe again and not have every muscle tensed and ready to spring. I was slowly making my way to happy.

Bella's twentieth birthday passed with me sitting in my bedroom alone, reliving that horrible day the year before. Every image that flashed through my vivid memory still tore at my soul but I had a feeling it always would but that day I realized I only felt an echo of my wolf. He was gone with barely a trace left but I still hadn't felt comfortable going home and tempting fate, so I stayed away longer. Truth be told, I was afraid to find out what had happened to Bella. I was afraid that she had chosen to become a bloodsucker and was lost to me for the rest of my life.

It wasn't until a year and a half had passed since the day I left that I couldn't even find an echo of my wolf in me, that I finally decided to leave my sanctuary and head home. I had learned that while I didn't want to live without Bella in my life, I could. I realized that while I would always love her with every piece of me, I would eventually find love again-maybe not as great or as strong but I'd find it again and I could be happy without her.

When I told Leah of my plans to return, she informed me she'd come with but that she was only going to visit and tell her mom and brother where she was. She was happier than I had seen her in a long time and I didn't blame her for not wanting to go back permanently.

We waited until I was finished with my current semester of school and finally, after one year and eight months gone, we made our way back to La Push to face the lives we left behind.

* * *

><p>For the first time in my life, I knocked on my own front door as I nervously shifted from one foot to the other. As my wolf faded, so did my preternatural sight, sound, smell and strength, so I only faintly heard my father wheel himself to the door.<p>

He opened the door with a gasp and his eyes opened wide and almost immediately his eyes filled with tears. For several long moments, he just stared at me in what I thought was disbelief. I guess I should have called first.

"Jake," he breathed out. "You're home."

"Hey, Dad. Yeah, I'm home," I responded, still nervous.

"Well, what are you still doing outside? Get yourself in here, son," he ordered gruffly.

I walked into the house I had called my home for nearly seventeen years to see that nothing had changed, other than that it looked cleaner. I made my way to the couch and plopped down; I bent forward and rested my elbows on my knees.

"How've you been, Dad?"

"I've been good. Rach and Paul moved in and they've helped take care of me when I needed it. I go fishing with Charlie every other weekend like usual, my life's just the same as it was before; I just missed my boy. What have you done with yourself?"

"I got my GED and did a year of school in a community college. Worked a lot and figured out what I want out of life," I summed up.

"Look, Dad, I'm really sorry for taking off like that and not really calling and checking up on you. I didn't make sure there was someone here to help take care of you. I've not been the best son the past couple years and I'm sorry," I told him, ashamed of the way I treated him.

"You did what you needed to do for you, I can't…I'm just glad you're back, son," he said and then sat silent for several minutes contemplating what to say next.

"Your wolf?" He asked as he eyed me.

"Gone."

"The imprint?"

"I think it's gone, but I can't be a hundred percent sure on that."

"Leah back?"

"Yeah, for a while. She wants to head back."

"That's good. Sue will be glad she's back. You staying?"

"Yep."

"Good, get your stuff in your room. You left it a mess and you need to clean it. We'll talk some more later." With that our conversation was over and we were back to the way it was before I left. Nothing more needed to be said between my dad and me. Though I had many more questions for him, I did what he said and moved all my things back into my room and spent the next two hours cleaning my room.

I knew my room could wait but I was fearful of asking my dad the questions that had been rattling around in my head since the day I left. I was afraid that she'd chosen to become my enemy but I was also afraid that she didn't, that she had chosen to remain human, because if she did I didn't know if that meant I had any hope at all.

With everything put away, I found no more reason to avoid the talk I needed to have with my father and made my way back into the living room to see him on the phone.

"Yes, that's what I said," he responded to the other person. "Well, I gotta go; he just walked into the room. Come over when you get a chance. Bye." And then he hung up.

"That was your sister, called her at work and told her. She'll come over when she can get a break from work." I just nodded and took my seat on the couch.

"Sue called; she's invited us to have lunch with everyone at her place." I nodded again but decided I wanted to go somewhere else.

"Dad, I should probably go and see Charlie, tell him I'm back." So, I chickened out and avoided what I wanted to ask. Give me a break.

"Oh well, lucky you, he'll be there, too. He's been spending loads of time with Sue these days, now that he's been clued in on the goings on round here. She's helped him a lot to deal with everything." His words caused a lead weight to form in my stomach. What the hell did he mean by that?

"Yes, you know exactly what I mean, son." Did I say that out loud? His nod confirmed my silent question. "…with everything that was going on with Bella and all that, it was decided he should be told. He now knows everything." While I was shocked that they had told Charlie about the wolves and I assumed the leeches as well, it was the 'everything going on with Bella' that kept echoing in my head, like I had been rung like a bell. I felt my stomach knot at the prospect of the information he only hinted at.

"Not now, son. We ought to head over to Sue's, she's waiting for us." With that, he left me sitting there with a gaping jaw and millions of questions needing to be answered. I had no choice but to follow him, so I did.

I helped Dad into the car and we drove the short distance to the Clearwaters. I had thought I was nervous when I knocked on my own door but that was nothing to what I was feeling at the moment.

Pushing my dad into the house, I took everything in. Sam, Emily, Paul and Jared were crammed on the sofa, all with drinks in their hands, talking amongst themselves. I'm sure Leah was thrilled with them here in her home. At this moment, I was so exceptionally glad that I had lost the ability to hear them from across the room. Paul and Jared gave me cold condescending looks and Sam just gave me the emotionless mask, nothing new and nothing I didn't expect. What I had done, they saw as a betrayal to the pack. Only Emily even looked remotely happy that I was here but that soon faded and she sent a furtive glance at the kitchen door. I followed her eyes and the breath was knocked from me.

There standing (actually standing) in the doorway looking like the perfect angel of my dreams. Her hair was a little longer but it looked like she had dyed it or something as there were darker streaks as well as bold bright coppers running through the entirety of it and it had been straightened. But it was her eyes, her amazingly deep dark chocolate eyes with little flecks of sugared honey and the deepest forest green shone with unshed tears, which got me. Her lower lip was quaking and she then quickly put it between her front teeth to stop its movement.

She was holding a little girl, with bright copper curly hair to her waist, on her hip. The child looked to be five or six and she had Bella's porcelain skin with her blushed rose cheeks and as I looked closer the same brilliant chocolate orbs that showed me everything.

I moved my eyes back to Bella. I couldn't believe it; Bella was in front of me in all her human glory, looking more beautiful than even my wildest imagination couldn't have produced. My eyes moved quickly to take in all of her. She was dressed in her well-worn chucks, dark jeans and flannel shirt over an obscure band's t-shirt-absolutely gorgeous and utterly perfect.

My eyes moved back to the little girl I knew to be Bella's daughter and was relieved to feel nothing more for her then the affection I would feel for any of Bella's children. Nothing of the imprint-of the latent instincts of the wolf-was left. I breathed a sigh of relief and slowly and carefully moved toward the two, as if I moved too quickly, they'd disappear on me.

"Bella," I whispered. I slowly raised my hand to cup her face, to feel the warmth of her skin, but stopped myself. I had always been touchy with her but I had been gone for over a year and I still had so many questions that needed to be answered before I could even call myself her friend.

She saw the jerk of my hand as I brought it to rest down by my side again. She slowly looked back up at me and whispered with tear filled eyes, "Jake."

"Hello, Jacob," Renesmee said brightly. "It has been a very long time since I saw you last. I hope all is well." It threw me, how formal her speech was, and irked me just the same; she sounded like a little Edward clone. I knew she wasn't even two yet but she looked three times her age and spoke like someone ten times her age and born over fifty years ago, it was a little disconcerting.

"All's good. How are you, Renesmee?" I asked her but kept my eyes on Bella. She stared questioningly between me and her daughter and then locked her eyes back on me.

"I'm doing exceptionally well, thank you very much," she said proudly.

"Ness, baby, how about you go see what Seth is up to? I'm sure he has something for you to play with," Bella said as she set her daughter down and kissed the top of her head.

"Okay, momma," Renesmee responded and skipped off upstairs. When she was gone, there was a heavy, awkward silence between us. I think both of us were afraid to speak. I noticed the room behind me was particularly silent. I slowly turned to see that the room had emptied and we were alone.

"Your hair," she whispered and I turned back around to see her staring at my inky locks which now went just past my shoulders. Pushing some back behind my ear, I nodded.

"Uh, yeah, I let it grow out now that I don't have to worry about twigs and brambles getting caught up in everything."

"I like it, I missed it," she stated firmly but her words sounded like there was something more behind them. She brought up her left hand to run her fingers through the bottom of the hair that lay on my shoulder. What I saw (more like what I hadn't seen) made the bottom drop out of my stomach. I had gotten so used to seeing it every day that I had visited her. It had become a part of her–a part I wasn't particularly fond of-and not seeing it adorn that particular finger…

I just didn't know what to think or feel.

She noticed my reaction and then realized what I was staring at. She quickly withdrew her hand and put it behind her back followed by her dropping her eyes from me.

"Bella?" I asked as my voice cracked hoarsely.

"How've you been, Jake?" She was avoiding the fluffy pink elephant that just marched his way into the Clearwaters' living room by asking me how I had been. I had figured when I came back that she'd still be with the offensive mind fuck; I just didn't know whether it would be as a human or not. But now, seeing her hand bare and free of that horribly gaudy-not her-ring…

I didn't want to hope. I couldn't even allow it into my system. I knew just because she wasn't wearing it didn't mean she wasn't with him. I knew wearing jewelry wasn't Bella's thing, so it shouldn't surprise me that she wasn't wearing a ring. But this wasn't just any ring and he wasn't just any man. I highly doubt he'd ever really be okay with her taking the thing off and she'd never do anything to displease him. Actually, it was surprising that he actually allowed her and their daughter on the rez at all.

My mind was filling with dozens upon dozens of questions and emotions I wasn't sure if I should let myself feel. Pushing off the importance or lack thereof of her bare finger, I gave her a small smile and began looking around for anything to distract the hope that was still bubbling beneath the surface.

She shifted from one foot to the other in her discomfort. She wouldn't raise her head to meet my eyes and even moved enough to cause her hair to cascade over her shoulders to shield her.

Before I could say anything else or press her, the front door slammed open and in burst Quil and Embry with matching smiles that split their faces.

"Jake, man, it's so fucking good to have your ass home. How've you been?" Quil bellowed.

"Quil, Ness is in the house. Can you watch your language, please?" Bella snapped in an impressive motherly chide. Then it really dawned on me. More than seeing her give birth, more than seeing her child daily for weeks or seeing her hold her child, hearing her speak like that left an indelible understanding that Bella was a mom-of course she was going to sound motherly.

Quil looked properly contrite and muttered a 'Sorry' and then turned back to me.

"So, how you been, man? Long time no hear. Haven't you ever heard of a phone?" I could tell by his tightly controlled smile he wasn't angry with me. Embry was looking between Bella and me like he was gauging on how I was reacting to something she told me-meaning she had something to tell me.

Again, my thoughts took in all the possibilities, but I couldn't do that; it'd only get me hurt in the end if it didn't turn out how I wanted.

Sure, I had come to the understanding that I could survive without her. I had done it for over a year. But that didn't mean I wanted to survive without her any more. I knew she was an integral part of my future happiness if she was no longer married or planning on becoming a leech. But if I let her in before I got the answers I needed, I'd be like the druggie I was before, needing my next hit that may not ever come again, and wolf withdrawal was bad enough.

Remembering what Quil had asked, I responded. "I've been good, man. Got my GED, took some classes at a local CC, worked some; I just enjoyed being me."

"You back for good?" Embry asked, eyeing Bella.

This was getting weirder and weirder.

"Yeah, Leah's not though."

"So, Leah did leave with you then?" He asked.

"Um, yeah, I thought everyone knew that?"

"No-I mean, it's what she told her mom but we weren't sure. All we knew was that you both disappeared the same day without much of a goodbye except to your dad and Bells here." I didn't like how he called her that; waves of jealousy boiled my blood. That was my and Charlie's nickname for her. If he was calling her Bells-how much time was she spending with the pack?

I turned my gaze back to her in silent question but she still hadn't looked up. I decided on asking the question that had made me come over in the first place.

"So, I heard Charlie heard about us," I hedged, hoping this would give me something in the way of answers.

"Oh yeah, that was some funny shit. I thought he was going to shoot Seth," Quil laughed.

"Quil, seriously, language. I question why Claire's mom even lets you close to her when you swear as much as you do," she snapped in incredulity.

"I don't swear around her," he retorted as if it was obvious.

"Then why in God's name do you around my daughter? I get that she ages quickly but that doesn't mean that you don't treat her like a child," Bella reproached.

"Sorry, Swan. I just forget sometimes 'cause she speaks more adult than Billy."

I finally couldn't take this. Swan? He called her Swan? All the questions that kept growing and gnawing at me, I needed answers and only one person was going to give them to me.

"Enough," I snapped, "Will somebody please start explaining what the hell is going on here, I need some fu-…answers."

Both Embry and Quil looked nervously between Bella and me and then quickly high tailed it out of the room, leaving me with Bella.

"Why is it whenever I ask a damn question, the person I'm asking leaves the freaking room?" I asked angrily to the air.

"Jake…uh…I'm s-s-sure you've realized that…uh…there's stuff…that there's a lot you don't know and I…," she stuttered nervously, never meeting my eyes. But before she could tell me anything, or really make much sense, we were interrupted-again.

"Hey, Jake, son, it's so great to have you back. We all missed you, especially Bells here, always worried about you and talking about you." Charlie came in from the back and clapped me on the shoulder.

"Yeah, it's good to be back, Chief. I'm gonna go out back and catch up," I said nonchalantly though I was anything but. Charlie's words about Bella just pissed me off. If she had missed me so much, then why the hell did she never fucking call?

I walked into the kitchen and then out the back door without even looking at Bella.

When I made it to the fire pit, I saw everyone besides Charlie and Bella outside. Quil, Paul and Jared were tossing a football around. Sam and Embry were manning the grill. Kim, Emily and Sue were working on placing all the sides on the large table next to the house. Leah was sitting, drinking a beer and talking to Seth who was watching Renesmee put what looked like a stereo together from the tiny pieces that were spread out on the tarp next to her. Leah looked up at me as I walked to them.

"Don't you look pleasant?" She remarked, taking in my scowl. "Talk not go well, lover boy?"

"Leah, don't, okay? Just…don't, please," Seth whispered pleadingly.

"Why should I? He's put himself through hell for her. You don't know how fucking hard it is to give up the wolf and he did it all for her. He gave up something that these other wolves would kill to keep. He's spent over two years fighting for her and her alone; he did it all for her and she doesn't even see it. Doesn't even appreciate it, just blames you for causing problems with the leech and the only reason she feels sorry is because seeing him makes her feel guilty, nothing more," she snapped back at him. What she had said quit being about me and Bella and became her and Sam. Even though she had started to move on, she hadn't. She and I were more alike than I ever wanted to admit. I know I should move on from Bella just like Leah should move on from Sam but…

I thought her still being human would mean something for me, or her being here on the rez. It had to mean something-and here I was again, having hope for things I shouldn't.

"Leah, while what you feel is totally justified and correct on some level, I would appreciate it if you could watch your language in front of my daughter. Her father doesn't like it when she comes back replaying such words in her memories," Bella said with resentment in her voice.

"Like I give a shit what you or your uptight leech husband think or want. If I wanna say fuck- I'm gonna say fuck whether your little leech spawn is around or not." Leah sneered back. Bella stared at her blankly but I could see fire in her eye like she wanted to say something but then let it drop and turned to her daughter.

"Ness, honey, can you clean that up, please? And go grab your things from upstairs. I'm going to take you to your father," Bella said, looking at her daughter.

"Sure, Momma." She moved to pick everything up at blinding speeds. "Seth, can I put this all back in your room or should I take it with me?" She looked at him in question and paused her clean up.

With a small smile, Seth replied, "Sure, you can put it in my room, sweetie. You know I don't care."

"Thanks, Sethy," she crooned happily and finished picking up the stereo parts and rushed indoors.

"Uh…Jake?" Bella spoke quietly, nervously chewing her bottom lip and I could see worry in her eyes. "I have to…um…run Ness to the Cullens but afterwards, if you have time-if you want- I'd really like to have that talk with you."

"Sure, Bella, I'd really like that," I answered truthfully.

"Okay, well, how 'bout the beach in, let's say, forty-five minutes?"

"That'd be great." With a genuine smile, she turned and walked back into the house.

I looked around at everyone as they stared at me. I could see the questions they were bursting to ask. So, I waited for one of them to break.

"Did you do it, Jake? Did you get rid of what you wanted to?" Sam asked from the grill, still trying to appraise the situation.

The way he had asked the question made it sound like the others didn't know about the imprint but I knew that couldn't be the case. There would be no way that Sam could have hidden something so big for so long.

"Yeah, it went with the wolf, made it damn hard to give up the wolf because of it, too," I snorted. It seemed like it was three times easier for Leah to fight her wolf than it was for me. Even though she stopped phasing two months after me, she felt her wolf was gone nearly six months before I did.

"Jake, man, what is Sam talking about? Is he talking about your wolf?" Quil asked, holding the ball in his hands.

I turned back to Sam in surprise. "You didn't tell them?" I asked in complete disbelief that he was even able to keep it a secret.

"Wasn't my place," he replied coolly.

"What the hell are you two going on about?" Paul griped.

"You guys seriously don't know? I thought for sure Sam would spread that shit like wild fire," Leah spoke up. She was going to love spreading this around. "Jakey boy here, he went and imprinted on Ness the day she was born." Gasps of shock sounded out around the yard.

"You gotta be fucking kidding me, there is no way he imprinted, we would've noticed. There's no way he fought it-impossible," Quil shouted and stood up.

"She's not…I did…you didn't and I did," I answered back.

"What? How? Huh?" He stuttered out.

"That's why you let the little half-leech down here, wasn't it? 'Cause she was an imprint?" Paul yelled at who I assumed to be Sam. Before either could speak, someone else did.

"That's why you quit, wasn't it? The day you left the house after everything went down…you didn't phase after that. It's 'cause you imprinted, isn't it?" Seth asked in understanding.

"Yes, once I realized everything-everything meaning, even though I imprinted on Renesmee, I was still in love with Bella, my feelings hadn't changed for her. Only my wolf was altered, not the man. I knew if I gave in to the wolf that I'd lose the only choice I had left. Guys, I've seen your imprints and how they altered all of you-mine was different. So, yeah, I gave up the wolf and the imprint went with it and I think the only reason that was possible was that I never let the bond fully form," I finished, wanting to get out of here.

"Does Bella know?" Embry asked quietly.

"I told her the day she woke up from her coma; I waited for her to wake up to tell her I planned on leaving," I answered him. "Speaking of Bella, I've got to head down to the beach. I'll talk to you guys later." I stood up and began to make my way to First Beach.

"Jake," I heard yelled from behind me. I turned to see Embry jogging to me. "When you talk to her, please just listen to her. You're not going to like all that is said but just…let her finish before you jump to conclusions or try to do anything stupid. Okay?"

"What things?" I said between clenched teeth.

"It's not my place, listen to her." He turned and walked back to the fire.

* * *

><p>I walked to the beach with a thousand pound weight on my shoulders. I needed answers and all I had been getting all day was more questions. Embry's words thundered through my head. I knew that I wasn't going to like some things. I mean, Bella was human and she and Ness (still had to get used to that) had obviously been spending quite a bit of time with all the wolves. They all looked so relaxed around her.<p>

I was afraid of what she had to say. Her being human was beyond my wildest dreams and so much more than I had wished for. All the pep talks I had had with myself before coming home about not getting my hopes up had been washed away the moment I saw her bare ring finger. I couldn't convince myself at that moment not to read anything into it.

I walked and found a seat somewhere down the beach a ways to wait for her. I was still lost in my thoughts, trying to find some clue in what had been said and what hadn't. Was there something I had missed in the bits of conversations I had?

No. I knew I hadn't missed anything. Dad had hinted at things when he informed me that Charlie knew; there had been no prompting on my part for that piece of information to come out. By what Embry and Quil had said, it was Seth who had showed him. But even that information didn't help me. There had been no reason given as to why he was told other than what had been going on with Bella. Could they be vaguer? I could tell by Bella's reaction to me seeing her finger bare that it was more than her not putting her ring on. It meant something because she didn't want me to see it.

Before I could think any further, the subject of my thoughts sat next to me on what I realized to be 'our' tree. She said nothing, only looked at the ocean, biting her lip and twisting and twining her fingers. I let her be, knowing she was trying to figure out how to say what she wanted.

After five minutes of the pregnant silence, I finally broke. "Bella, you have to be the first one to speak. You were the one who wanted to talk to me," I said calmly.

"Right…yeah, you're right." She went silent again but instead of fixing her gaze back to the rolling sea, she turned to face me and took a deep breath. She folded her legs up underneath her.

"Is it gone?" And she waited for me for a moment, interrupting before I could even answer. "The imprint with Ness, is it gone or are you…will you be like Quil?" She went back to biting her lip and picking at her jeans.

"Bells," I whispered, wanting for her to look up at me. Her bottom lip trembled and then she burst into tears. I had no clue why. I didn't know what to do. I knew what I would have done had this happened before I left but we weren't the same anymore and I didn't know what she wanted so I just sat there and stared.

"Bells, what's wrong? What happened…I…" She started shaking her head back and forth and I shut up.

"Y-y-you c-called me-me Bells," and her sobs continued anew. I was dumbfounded. Was I not supposed to call her that?

"I'm sorry; I thought it was okay, I always call you that. Embry called you that. Is it not okay?" I asked, worried I had done something horribly wrong; worried that we weren't close enough for her to allow me to call her Bells.

"What? No. I'm sorry I'm crying like this, it's just been so long since you've called me that. The last time I heard it from you was before Ness was born. It's not the same when others call me it. I've missed hearing you say it so much and when you didn't earlier today…I-I-I thought you never would." Her breathing was heavy and forced as she tried to calm herself.

"I'm sorry, if you want me to call you Bells then I will. If you don't want me to, then I won't. Just, please, quit crying. I hate it when you cry." I picked up her left hand and began running my thumb over the back of it.

She spent the next several minutes calming her breathing and staring at our joined hands. Following a deep shuddering breath, she looked at me and gave me a small bleary eyed smile.

"So…," I hedged.

"So…I'm sure you have lots of questions. Things you heard or saw but back to my question. The thing with Ness…"

"Ness? Where'd that come from?" I asked, curious as I had assumed her nickname would have been Mae, like it was when I left.

"What? Oh, yeah, I kinda came up with it. When Edward told me that everyone was calling her Mae-I don't know-I just rebelled against it. I don't know if it was 'cause they weren't calling her the name I had given her or if it was 'cause it was Rosalie who'd come up with it or even if it wasn't me or Edward who'd given her the nickname. When we had to create papers for her, ones that would be changed often because of her rapid aging, I had to come up with another name for her, one that was more common.

"While I was sitting in the hospital after you left, I kept thinking about the fact that we hadn't really talked about Ness. I understood why you didn't want to and then you were gone. I kept trying to imagine you taking her, holding her, and being there for her when I was asleep. Stuff you would do because of the imprint. The stuff you ran from. I imagined what you would have said when you heard her name. I figured you'd say something like 'her name was a mouthful so I shortened it.' When I heard you say those words I knew how you would have done that. You wouldn't have called her Mae or Ren. You would've called her Ness or Nessie so her other name became Vanessa," she reasoned.

"You nicknamed your daughter after the Loch Ness Monster?" I choked out in a laugh.

"What! No. Only you would think something like that." She laughed back and a heaviness that I hadn't known was on my heart was lifted.

"Sure, sure," I replied back and the lightness that had lit up her face seconds ago darkened.

"Back to the question I asked you before I started bawling like a baby. The reason you left was to get rid of the imprint and the wolf. Did you?" The question at the end was an almost whisper.

I brought my hand up to her cheek and cupped it. "What do you feel?" I asked.

"Warmth. You've always been warm, Jake, you know that," she said in a tone that sounded an awful lot like 'Duh.'

"But I'm not as warm as I was, am I?"

"No, you're not. Is that 'cause…is the wolf gone?"

"Yeah, the wolf is gone and with him went my super high temperature, the really good hearing, eyesight and sense of smell, the super strength, and everything else that I got because of him." I tried to put emphasis on the last part.

"So, the imprint is gone? You don't feel anything for Ness?" Her voice was full of worry.

"I don't not feel anything for Ness," Her brows furrowed and fear filled her eyes. "But the imprint is gone, I promise. All I feel for her is the adoration that she is your daughter and I can see you in her and it amazes me. Sure, I see Cullen in her but I have this feeling that while she may look more like him, her personality is becoming like you." I smiled, hoping to reassure her.

"So, in like five years you're not going to fall in love with her or anything?"

"What! Why the hell are you asking if I'd fall in love with a seven year old Bella? That's just sick," I snapped at her in horror.

"No, not like that. I know you're not like that. Eww. The way Ness develops is different than with other children. You know that. At around seven she will be a completely mature twenty year old and she'll quit aging."

"Oh. Sorry I snapped at you. How do you know she'll quit?"

"After I got out of the hospital, Alice and Jasper went to Brazil to look for beings like Ness. You see while in Brazil with Edward, the cleaning lady knew what he was and when she realized that I was pregnant she was thinking about a story that pointed to old knowledge of half-vampire half-human children. They found one and he told them that he quit aging around his seventh year and he was in his hundred and fiftieth."

"So, what you're saying is that in five years, your daughter will only look a few years younger than you and older than her father?" I asked in disbelief. I couldn't really picture it.

"Yeah. She will."

"Bells, I hate to upset you or anything but I gotta ask: why is it you are still human and down in La Push?"

"Uh, well, that's a long story," she mumbled.

"Well, I got time." I wasn't going to give in. I was going to get some answers today.

"Okay," She took a deep breath and looked up at me. "I'm going to start from the day I woke up. I stayed in the hospital another week after I woke up. I got to finally meet my daughter. It was hard to realize I had missed the first three weeks of her life and when I saw that she already looked to be nearly a year old, I couldn't stand it.

"I decided to put off my change until she was done growing. I didn't want to miss anytime of her incredibly short childhood concerned with bloodlust and newborn aggression." Her words stopped my heart. She was only going to be human for five more years.

"Edward agreed with my waiting to change, it was what he wanted in the first place and Alice's vision that had he tried to change me when he did would've killed me made him fearful to do it again. Throughout all of this, I was healing from incredibly painful wounds and physical complications. I had to go through hours of physical therapy a day just so I could stand and walk normally again.

"After I got out of the hospital, Charlie came over a lot. Having me nearly die had him fearful of losing me. The hard part about that was that I didn't like hiding Ness from him, both for her and his sake. She is his granddaughter and they deserved to know one another. When I told this to Edward and the rest of the Cullens, they were very hesitant. They didn't want to have to reveal the secret to another human. They were also afraid of his reaction to the truth.

"That's when the problems started. Edward and I argued about telling Charlie. I wanted to do it and he did not. I planned on just telling Charlie but every time I tried, Edward would stop me.

"I let the subject drop for the time being and I spent all my time helping Ness to adjust to her fast paced life and try to give her the mile stones that most other children have. The problem with that was I was the only one to remember my childhood and I was the only other living person in the house. None of them really understood what I was trying to do. They thought birthday parties and other events like that were the things I was trying to do. They didn't get it 'cause they weren't living.

"The problem was that I couldn't just let Ness interact with other children. Her rapid aging would raise too many questions. I decided that the members of the pack may be my best bet. So by myself, I went to La Push to speak with Sam. I explained everything to him. I told him what I wanted to do and that I believed he and the pack could help."

"So, you're telling me that the pack has been helping you give your daughter the childhood she would miss otherwise?"

"Yeah, that's how it started. You see the thing is: I knew that the pack could give her this chance to feel somewhat like a normal child. Edward of course voiced his displeasure with this idea but could come up with no adequate alternative.

"After months of fighting him on several things, I came to a startling realization. With seeing Charlie more and more and helping my daughter try to live her life, I realized that I had stopped doing just that the moment Edward came into my life. I entered a holding pattern, waiting for him to change me so we could live our life together. I was waiting for life to happen to me as a vampire. Even when he was gone…I was waiting-always waiting. So I started to live my life. I did things I wanted to do. I brought Ness with me to visit the wolves without asking Edward because I knew they wouldn't harm either of us. Edward's fears weren't really fears, just his controlling nature.

"We argued about everything now and I was sick of it. By this time, we hadn't even been married a year and I was already feeling stifled. I wanted changes; he just wanted to wait until I changed. By now, he was pushing for me to change early. To not wait until Ness was full grown.

"The big problem was that I was beginning to second guess that decision. I saw the things I'd miss out on once I became a vampire. Things I no longer wanted to give up." Her words were almost the ones I had waited so long to hear. But I kept my hope in check.

"I was afraid to tell Edward that I no longer wanted to become a vampire when he was now intent on doing it as soon as possible. I bit the bullet after Ness' birthday. I told him all of the reasons why I was no longer willing to become like him. He didn't listen, he blamed you. We fought. I was yelling at him and he yelled back. I started throwing things at him even though I wanted to hit him but knew I'd just hurt myself. I should have been paying attention to him but I wasn't. I don't remember what I threw but it angered him so badly he rushed at me and pushed me. I know he only did it lightly and only to stop me," she defended. I was furious. If I hadn't been so sure the wolf was gone, I would have worried that my shaking was a sign I was going to phase. At the moment, I wished I was still a wolf so I could tear him apart and burn his ass.

"But he didn't consider his strength and he pushed me into a wall and knocked me unconscious for several hours. When I woke, he told me he was sorry. I forgave him. Don't look at me like that-let me explain, please," she asked me when I felt my eyes bulge.

"I forgave him for the things he had said but not pushing me. I forgave him but I knew that I couldn't be with him any longer. We wanted different things out of our lives. I loved him still. I always will-he is the father of my child. I asked for a divorce and full custody of Ness until she reached maturity. I already knew that my time with her was going to be limited. I'd only get a fraction of the time with her that he will get or I would have gotten. He agreed under the stipulation that he could provide for me and Ness completely and that he got her on the weekends and he was in charge of her education."

I wanted to jump up and down and scream thanks to the heavens. Bella was staying human and she was no longer married to Dickward. Really, my life couldn't get any better. Instead of doing what I wanted, I just squeezed Bella's hand and gave her a blinding smile.

"So, with the divorce in order, I moved out of the Cullens' and into my own place just outside of Forks and La Push. Far enough into the forest that Ness could play outside and with the wolves without prying eyes but close enough for me to see Charlie and get Ness to the Cullens' when needed.

"The first on my list of priorities was to introduce Charlie to his granddaughter. With the Cullens against it, the wolves volunteered to be the side to tell first; Seth the one to offer to show him."

"So, besides almost shooting Seth, how'd he take everything?"

"He was mad, very mad. He yelled at me for days. When he wasn't yelling, he refused to talk to me. He had trouble forgiving me for the fact that I had been willing to die-to become a vampire. He even yelled at me for the way I treated you. But then he came to terms with everything. He adores Ness and likes all the wolves. I think it gave him some peace of mind that they had been around to help me when the Cullens left. I also think that he likes that Sue understands him and where he is coming from and he doesn't have to lie to her.

"So, now you know why I am in La Push with Ness and I don't have a ring on my finger. Now, how have you been, what have you been doing?"

"Me, well, when I got there, I told you about getting my GED. Like you heard me tell Quil and Emb, I took some classes at the community college. I focused on Automotive Tech and Business. I got one year done. Now that I'm back, I'm planning on seeing if I can take more classes in PA and get a job at Dowling's until I have enough saved up to open my own place. I spent a lot of time running in the woods, working off energy to keep my wolf at bay. Otherwise, I lived a very simple life," I finished but noticed she looked nervous again.

"That's good…good, so, any girls in your life?" She asked.

"The only girl in my life was Leah, Bells." Her eyes comically popped wide and her jaw dropped. "Oh God, no, nothing like that, Bells. Ew, just…disgusting." I shivered at the thought and laughed. I decided to ask a question for which I was afraid of the answer.

"How 'bout you, any new men in your life?"

She snorted. "Don't think that's possible with a pack of wolves and a coven of vampires to run interference on any man that walks within ten feet of me." I fell silent.

"Jake?" Her voice became so quiet that I had to strain to hear her over the ocean.

"Yeah, Bells?"

"I know when you left you told me about how you loved me and that I was your choice. Is that…do you…feel the same or…," she was stuttering and tripping over the words she wanted to say and the words that were actually making their way out of her mouth.

"Bella, I have been in love with you for a very long time. It didn't change when you repeatedly pushed me away, telling me you didn't-couldn't-wouldn't love me in return. It didn't lessen when I saw you married to your choice-the choice you believed was enough when I wasn't nor did it lessen when I saw you dying-literally-to bring his child into the world. I didn't love you any less after my wolf imprinted on your daughter or when I chose to leave to get rid of the wolf. I don't think I could ever not love you and you will always be my number one choice."

"Okay," and then she dropped her eyes and hands from me. "There is something that I haven't told you, something that I left out." She stopped talking and shook her head.

"It's okay, Bells; you don't have to tell me if you don't want." I never did like seeing her uncomfortable like this.

"No. No, I need to tell you I just…I don't know how you'll feel about everything.

"I told you about how Edward and I argued about raising Ness and my change but that wasn't the only thing we argued about. The thing we argued about most was you.

"We began to disagree while I was still in the hospital. Then it was mostly about you imprinting on Ness and also how you spent every day in the hospital waiting for me to wake up. He resented the fact that I woke up with you in the room. I tried to calm him and console his fears but he wouldn't listen to me.

"Then you called me and he flipped. Saying I was his wife and that you should leave me alone. I argued back that you were leaving me alone; you weren't even in the same state. Again, he'd just grumble."

"I couldn't quit thinking about you. I missed you so much. When Edward and I would argue, I would just want to run to you and talk my problems out with you-even though I knew it was wrong of me on so many levels. When I realized I wanted to postpone my change, I wanted to tell you because I knew you'd be happy, but I didn't 'cause I was still planning on changing."

"Why did you never call me? I wanted and I waited for you to call me, yet you never did."

"I know, I just couldn't. At first, it was that whenever you were mentioned, Edward would get pissed off. So, I avoided mentioning you and calling you, then later…later, I was just afraid.

"When I went to the pack for help with Ness, I thought about you and what you'd say. Your voice was an ever present companion to me.

"I couldn't figure out why he was always so hostile and angry when it came to you. I mean I married him, and had a child with him and even when I no longer chose to become like him, I was still planning on being with him until I died. Yet anything I said wasn't enough for him. In truth, they started to become lies-to him and to myself.

"As I struggled with the idea of me changing, I knew deep down I couldn't live an eternity without you. I thought I had missed you those two months you were gone but that was nothing compared to how I felt when a year had passed and I hadn't heard from you. I didn't even want to imagine what I would feel like without you fifty, a hundred years from now.

"With Edward never being happy with me the way I was deciding to be, it brought back some things you said to me on your bed so long ago. You always loved me for the way I was, not the way I had been or the way I could be and if I changed who I was I knew you'd love me for that as well.

"The fight that caused Edward to push me, that was about you as well. I finally had enough of him insulting you all the time and I called him out on everything. I guessed I pushed a few buttons on him and he finally told me why he hated you so much and it all boiled down to you imprinting on Ness."

"What? He barely said anything to me afterwards or even in the weeks following. We didn't talk about it. Why the hell would he bring it up with you a year later as a point of contention and not mention it to me?" I really hated that fucking leech.

"I know, he told me. The problem he had with it wasn't because you imprinted on Ness, it was the fact that your feelings for me didn't change." I just stared at her in open mouth shock.

"You see, with Edward's ability he knew a lot about imprinting from Sam, Jared, Quil and your thoughts. He could see things in your memories and subconscious that even you didn't realize was there. He knew things about you that he…this is hard to talk about Jake and it's going to piss you off.

"After you imprinted on Ness, he started connecting the dots for what imprinting was believed to be. If it was what Sam or your dad thought, then your imprinting disproved that. Whether you like it or not, imprinting on Ness shouldn't have happened. She is half your mortal enemy. Your wolf should have rebelled against it. Carlisle doesn't think, that if had you started a relationship with Ness in the future that any offspring could have actually been produced." I think I made a gagging sound at the thought and my body shuddered in revulsion.

"Edward believes that you were always supposed to imprint on me but because I had been so blinded by my feelings for him and wrapped up in his world that I blocked it-that he blocked it. So, when I was dying on the table, giving life to my daughter, a piece of me went with her. At the time you imprinted on her, she was the only human part of me alive. When I was revived, it prevented your wolf from completing the bond with her and let you-the human-keep the feelings you had before."

I was speechless and dumbfounded. She had just unloaded a shit load of information and I was having trouble processing everything. Not only was it a lot of information but it was things I had thought for a very long time. Not that I ever thought that Bells was supposed to be my imprint. I never thought that. I always believed that she was my soul mate. I didn't need wolfy magic to tell me that. I felt it in our connection, in the way we could read one another and now the one thing I hated above all others- my competitor for Bella's heart- had told her it was true. She should have been mine and he had stopped it.

While I was glad to hear it, I didn't know how it was supposed to affect me now. I knew Bella was now an unmarried woman and she said she missed me while I was away and that I was part of the reason she wanted to remain human. I just didn't know where that left us. Were we just friends or did she want more?

"What…why are you telling me this, Bella?"

"I was wrong and blind. When I told you that you weren't enough, I was wrong. I couldn't see the truth. It took me falling out of love with Edward myself to see that. I didn't question why I ever fell in love with you when I should have. I mean, if I was so in love with Edward why did I fall in love with you and why did that love continue to grow even after he came back? So, when Edward and I started nearing the end of our marriage, I started to look at that and really take it all into consideration. When he told me this, it made me angry because he was blaming you for what I felt for you."

"What do you feel for me?" My voice didn't sound like me, it was filled with hope and fear, tinged with tension and peace and struggling to get around the enormous lump that had formed at her words.

"Even when I didn't see it, even when I denied it once I did, even when you were hundreds of miles away, I loved you and I still do. When you told me you imprinted on my daughter, I didn't feel like a mother should have felt. I didn't feel worried for her or angry at you. I was jealous and resentful of her for getting you. You were supposed to be mine and not hers. When you told me you were leaving to fight it, I was ecstatic.

"I'm telling you all this because I want a chance with you. I know I don't deserve one because I have hurt you more than anyone deserves to be hurt. I know I've pushed you away over and over again. All I can tell you is that I am so terribly sorry for what I've done to you. I finally see what you were trying to tell me and I just hope that you'll give me a chance to make it up to you. But if you don't want to give me a chance, I hope that we can be friends again. I really miss you in my life. It has felt like I've been living in the dark for nearly two years and now that your back the sun is finally shining. Will you give me another chance?"

"Why didn't you call me after you asked Cullen for a divorce?" I asked as I felt the weight of her words.

"I was afraid to tell you everything that had gone on. Afraid that you had moved on, found someone better for you than me, someone who wouldn't hurt you like I did. I was afraid the imprint wasn't gone and that if I called you and you came back, you'd be like Quil is with Claire and that in five years I'd have to see you in love with my daughter. I don't think I would have been able to handle that. I didn't call you 'cause I was terrified of you hating me like I deserved." Tears were shining on her cheeks and she was furiously trying to wipe them away.

"Bells, I wish you would have called me. Now, I know you want an answer now but you've given me a lot to think about and I want to consider everything before I give you one."

"Right, I understand. I'll be staying with Charlie and Sue this weekend since Edward has Ness for the weekend and I don't like staying in my house by myself, so if you want to find me, I'll be there." She stood up and left me sitting with my thoughts on our tree.

I needed to move; I couldn't sit here and let all this weigh me down. I got up and made my way to my house, pulled my sneakers out of the rabbit and went for a run.

From what Bella told me, she first put her change on hold to wait until Ness reached full maturity. She was trying to give her as normal a childhood as she could and the pack was who she turned to. As she lived her life, she realized the importance of it. Through all of this, her and the leech were fighting and mainly about me. Bella's feelings for me helped cause the end of her marriage. She wanted to have a chance with me.

She had told me almost everything I had ever wanted to hear. She was choosing me. She wanted to try for a future with me. I had heard the words but still couldn't believe them. I had been trained not to expect things like this from Bella except for in my dreams. I knew I didn't need to pinch myself but still I had trouble really believing her. I was also afraid to as well. What if I agreed and gave in to her only for her to go back to the leech again? But also what if I didn't and I lived to regret it?

Without realizing it, I had run the reservation and ended up in front of the Clearwater house. I had already made the decision. I think I truthfully made it the moment I saw her standing in the doorway to Sue's kitchen or even way before then. I had forgiven her all her faults against me and all I wanted was the future I had envisioned long ago.

Before I could rap on the door, it was flung open by a shocked and wide eyed Bella. She quickly schooled her face but I could see the worry in the depths of her eyes. I gave her a blinding smile and she jumped into my arms, wrapping her arms tightly around my neck.

She pulled back to look at me and without thought, I brought my mouth to hers. I kissed her with everything in me. I let her feel the love I had for her, the pain our separation caused me, the hurt of her choosing the leech, the happiness that she was human, and the joy that she was here in my arms and she was choosing me. I let her feel it all with the kiss until we were both out of breath and my knees were weak.

I didn't know what our future held, hell I didn't even know what next week would look like. We had limitless options in front of us. All I knew was that I wanted to face all of that with her by my side like it was supposed to have been from the day she came to me with those two broken and worthless bikes. We were going to face life together, hand in hand, without monsters and without magic, just two best friends that fell in love out of the pain of heartache.

The road to this moment was long, bloody and painful but every sting to my heart and every broken bone were worth it. From this day forward, I was going to live my life with the love of my life, my best friend, Bella Swan, and I couldn't think of anything better.

Fin.

**A/N:** Let me know what you think. Thank you so much to SMI4Life for pre-reading and beta'ing this. She took on the task of correcting this behemoth as well as being the cause for me to even attempt this story. Thanks also to JSH for also pre-reading this. You two give me the support I can't live without.

To those who are reading Home Again: I will be updating shortly, real life and some struggle with the chapter have delayed an update. I am terribly sorry for this.


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